Profiles:
Richard Belluzzo

Richard Belluzzo

BS 75, LHD 04

US Venture Partner at INNOGEST SGR SpA

Leading with a Hard Head & a Soft Heart

Rick Belluzzo is a managing director at Corso Partners. He was previously the CEO
and Chair of Quantum Corp., the 30-year-old electronic records storage company located
in San Jose, California, whose products store a trove of corporate data. The company
sold its hard drive business in 2001 and Rick came aboard in 2002 charged with turning
around Quantum and reinventing the stalwart storage company and former hard drive
supplier into a storage systems company -- a tall order in today's highly competitive
information technology market.

Going to college was not a tradition in his family; Rick was the first and only family
member who graduated.

Of his experience at GGU, Rick says, "In some ways I was typical of what GGU stood
for. I attended Santa Rosa Junior College and had to pay my own way. The tuition was
$11 per semester! I came to GGU because I had to work while finishing my degree. I
took day classes and some night classes and was hired as an intern at Hood & Strong.
It was a focused life. I took the bus back and forth and had classes in the morning,
in the afternoon, and I worked in the financial district and studied on the bus. It
took me 4 years and one additional semester to complete my degree."

It is clear that Rick credits his experience at Hewlett Packard with sculpting his
professional personality and honing his leadership skills. He started with HP in their
Santa Rosa office, before moving to Boise, Idaho, where he spent most of his effort
establishing the companys laser printer and imaging divisions. After 22 years of success,
Rick was confronted with the decision to try to become the CEO of HP or to try something
different. After some thought, Belluzzo resigned from Hewlett Packard in 1998, and
left Boise, Idaho, to become President and CEO of Silicon Graphics Inc. in Redwood
City, California, a high-end graphics computer manufacturer which at its peak boasted
annual sales of $4 billion and employed 10,000 people.

After two years at SGI, Rick left after putting in a great deal of effort to salvage
the business whose products were being eclipsed by the desktop PC. However, shortly
after leaving SGI, Belluzzo was hired to head up Microsoft's Consumer and Commerce
Group, which included MSN Internet services, the XBox video game and a series of other
consumer-oriented businesses. In February 2001, he assumed the role of President and
COO, where he would remain until a major restructuring in April 2002.

After leaving Microsoft, Belluzzo was enlightened by Barry Diller, the highly-regarded
CEO and Chair of IAC. IAC operates leading and diversified businesses in sectors being
transformed by the Internet, including Expedia, Ticketmaster, Lending Tree, RealEstate.com,
Match.com, Citysearch, and Evite. Diller spoke persuasively about the evolution of
the Internet in the technology industry and the need for leaders with Rick's skills
to help troubled companies through transformation. Rick was inspired to look at the
opportunity to run Quantum Corp.

Thinking back on his education, Rick remembers Golden Gate University fondly: "GGU
was a perfect fit for me. It is a special place. I enjoyed my time there. GGU's mission
to offer practical education to working adults is worth more today than ever. GGU
continues to serve a real purpose in the needs of working people, just as it did for
me. In the past, you went to college and then to work for one company, where you stayed
and worked, and that tended to be what you did for the remainder of your career. Now,
thats not good enough. We have to think about reinventing ourselves during our careers,
and having a formal academic process to support that changeover is essential."